I’ve only watched the first night so far and if the second doesn’t pick up, I think I’ll be sitting this one out. Really liked the Indian and Russian judge. The Australian chick might be a keeper too. I agree the numbers were way too high for the Irish and, as Exapno mentioned, too limited in their movements. I thought the South African team was robbed, as well as the marks were too low for the Chinese girls and the solo Indian. The USA seemed to go for the WOW factor instead of honest-to-goodness competitive dance. And there didn’t seem to be enough passion in the romantic dances.
Finally, I was thrilled to see Pasha. The solo Russian girl was adorable and I have no idea what to make of the South African judge. But only the Argentinian and Irish, who looked to only be protecting his country’s high score, judges eventually rubbed me the wrong way. Oh, and Flatley’s accent cutting in and out, not to mention the lack of critiques had this really close to suck. I wanna like it, but you know there’s something wrong when you get more feedback on MTV’s America’s Best Dance Crew.
Hopefully what was on tonight will be better. Otherwise I miss Nigel and almost Mary Murphy. :eek:
The judges were a little chattier on the second night, though they still weren’t delivering detailed critiques, or even explanations of their scores. Hopefully once the field is winnowed out a bit and they have more time, they will.
The Argentinian judge made it pretty clear they were on a time limit- she was in the process of defending a low mark, and stopped herself, waved a hand, and said “Don’t make me go over” (with the implication being “go over time”). So yes, I also hope that now we don’t have to rush through bunches of performances that we’ll get more feedback (though I still think the Chinese judge doesn’t actually speak English).
It seemed to me that on the second night, the stick slid out from up the butt of the Argentenian judge. Also, the South American judge, but his stick slide seemed to happen nearer to the end of the second show. I like the fact that the US judge is generous with his scores.
The first US soloist, Robert Muraine, the popper guy did audition for So You Think You Can Dance. He actually made the cut to final 20, but decided it wasn’t for him and voluntarily stepped aside for another male dancer to get that spot.
Nigel was so blown away by what he could do, he did bring him back twice last season, once a time filler guest and later in a “dance off” with another popper.
His first solo on this show was very short, and I hope he’ll be given a chance to show off his unique skills a little more later in during the run of this show.
The S. African judge, despite his snooty arrogance and molester mustache, was absolutely correct with his scores and criticisms so far IMO. Dance is supposed to be about musicality, choreography, and technique–not about Vegas sideshow posing and tricks. Martial arts with a drum beat is simply not dance, nor are acrobatic and balance tricks. The Chinese couple for example, though highly skilled, would barely merit a ‘meh’ compared to other Chinese acrobats and dancers I’ve seen in person.
I also agree with the dour Argentinian woman’s harshness. Holy crap, if she’s worked with Astaire and Rogers, then this must feel like a rural high school talent show to her in comparison to who she probably works with normally.
What did y’all think of the way they handled the three way tie on the soloists? Judges from those countries do not get a vote, all others chose who stays…seemed to be a fair method.
I take it twickster and Gargoyle didn’t approve of Robert staying over the Austraalian tap dancer and…who was the other one again?
I thought the first Chinese dancer, the one who did the traditional ribbon type dance, was kinda robbed on her scores.
Agree that is a fair method, though I’d’ve preferred less pandering to the US competitor. (I assume he was kept because he was from the US, not because he was the best of the three.)
Of course, my bias is that I’ll almost always pick the tap-dancer over just about any competitor.
ISTR it was the Argentinian woman, the one who did the tango with the empty shirt. I would’ve picked her over the popper, personally.
I like the tie-breaking system, but think I’d prefer them all voting, then showing the results. I have to wonder how much of an impact hearing the other numbers is having on later votes, like the Russian judge. It might be nice to mix things up a bit and go in a different order, like starting on the bottom row or something.
I think the other was one of the Irish stepper women. I actually think Robert was superior to either of those two as an enjoyable performance, but agree that his performance was still just contortion tricks set to a beat (which most pop/lock/break stuff is IMO). On dance criteria merits, the Irish should have won.
Yeah, I consider it something Marcel Marceau would have done, but what do I know?
I’m going to give the show another shot since I’m somewhat invested in it (hey, my wife made me watch), but a few thoughts:
– Flatley, please at least pretend you aren’t reading cue cards word for word. He makes me appreciate Ryan Seacrest.
– I initially thought each country was going to perform only dances native to their country, and I thought, “What in the world is Australian dance?”
– As others have mentioned (and some of the judges), some of the acts, while good, were more circus than dance, such as the Argentinian bolo “dancers.” Didn’t the Argentinian judge say something like, “They didn’t do what they were supposed to”? They were rightfully down-scored.
– Yeah, the scoring started way too high (10 = pretty good, 9 = didn’t suck, and so on), but seems to have been a tad more realistic later. I haven’t seen anything blow me away yet, though. The closest so far was the Argentinian couple’s tango.
– It would help if the competition process was explained a bit more. I know there’s going to be quarterfinals, semifinals, and a final, but is this for each country as a whole? Or each dance type? Why does it seem some countries are doing multiple duets while others aren’t? Or did I miss something.
– C’mon, let the judges bicker. This isn’t the Olympics.
I couldn’t believe how low they scored the Indian woman’s solo. She was AMAZING. I also liked India’s group dance, which they also scored low.
Some of the scores and comments were just plain annoying. Luckily, I have a DVR, so I could just watch the dancing and screw their inputs. Too bad they have the say on who stays and goes.
There are really four competitions going on at the same time: solo, duet, group, and overall. There will be one winner for each category, with the “overall” winner being basically Best In Show. Each country got two solo performances, one duet, and one group performance for the quarters. We’ve lost the two bottom groups, two bottom duets, and eight bottom solos (that’s where the Irish female soloist was bumped, Gargoyle- the first Russian woman, plus the Irish, Argentinian, Chinese, and US women, and the African, Chinese, and Australian guys), and now are moving on to the semi-finals.
I had go hunting to find who’d gotten booted (didn’t like relying on my poor memory), and found that this show is getting slammed on both the NBC site and TWOP message boards. Most of the comments are related to the judging, but they’re also complaining about production issues (have to agree with the complaints about the lights shining into the audiences’ eyes, and the cameras focusing everywhere but where the action is) and the choice of dancers.
Yes, the second night was a definite improvement overall in the terms of dance quality, scoring and judge up-tightness. I thought there was more passion, but still too much ‘tricks’ rather than what they are there for. I wonder if some of these are suffering from lack of, say, world class choreography rather than skilled performers because, just like the routine that Team USA did, I felt it would’ve been much better on SYTYCD.
I’m sufficiently happy enough with the most recent proceedings to stick with it. I just wish I knew who I felt like rooting for.
I forgot about this one. And they kept moving around. I ended up at one point yelling, “Hold the bleepin camera still! You’re making me dizzy!” Woke poor Bog up, too.
Ooh, I forgot about this show. Now I have a good reason to get my SO to put the desktop computer (with digital tv card) back together.
I hope the camera angles aren’t too annoying…I was just bitching about that a few weeks ago watching a couple different versions of the Nutcracker with my mom.
Fred Astaire commanded that the camera show his whole body, including his feet, 60 years ago. Why nobody else has learned from that example I can’t understand. They’re dancers, not professional smilers. Show us more than their faces.
Each country got two solo performances, one duet, and one group performance for the quarters. We’ve lost the two bottom groups, two bottom duets, and eight bottom solos (that’s where the Irish female soloist was bumped, Gargoyle- the first Russian woman, plus the Irish, Argentinian, Chinese, and US women, and the African, Chinese, and Australian guys), and now are moving on to the semi-finals.